


proof of life in the shadows

by hollow_city



Category: Batman (Comics)
Genre: Adopted Sibling Relationship, Autistic Tim Drake, Bruce Wayne is a Bad Parent, Gen, I think?, Light Angst, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Moving On, that's the gist here even though it's not explicitly talked about
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-11
Updated: 2020-04-11
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:29:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,928
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23591605
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hollow_city/pseuds/hollow_city
Summary: tim drake doesn't want to be red robin anymore. that is just the beginning.[or, tim hangs up the cape.]
Relationships: Cassandra Cain & Tim Drake, Tim Drake & Alfred Pennyworth
Comments: 12
Kudos: 256





	proof of life in the shadows

**Author's Note:**

> so this all came from leave the city by twenty one pilots and this has been a thing in my mind for like a year and i guess since it's now 5am during a pandemic i had to write it. and listen usually i write good dad bruce and i love good dad bruce but this is not good dad bruce  
> ps all tim drakes are autistic and that's my story thank you

It has been five years since Tim Drake first starting living out his wildest dreams. 

When he was a kid, all he wanted to do was to be like Robin. Be like Batman. Fight crime and save people and prove that he's worth something. 

He's seventeen now and, somehow, his wildest dream became a chore when he wasn't looking. 

Suiting up no longer gives him the same rush of dopamine, the same feeling of _this is right_ , the same feeling of belonging. Leaving his apartment through the window during the darkest hours of the night makes something behind his eyes ache and his muscles twinge. 

It isn't a sudden realization, either. It doesn't hit him in the face and leave him reeling. It's a slow progression that brings him to where he is now, standing over the case that holds his suit in his closet. 

He hasn't opened the case in eight consecutive nights. He told Bruce it was because he had a cold at first, but after the third day, he told Steph it was because he had a lot of WE work to do, and she passed the news along. He hasn't _wanted_ to open the case in eight consecutive weeks. 

Tim wants to leave, he realizes at that moment. Unlike the previous realization, which has rolled around in his brain for months and settled in his bones, this one hits him in the face and suddenly he's sitting on the floor. 

Tim doesn't want to be Red Robin anymore. For all he had wanted it as a child, he wants none of it now. He just wants to be Tim Drake. Not Red Robin, the genius vigilante, or Timothy Drake-Wayne, the prodigy of a CEO, just Tim. He wants to be Tim.

He's rocking in place and it takes him a minute to realize, and then he's trying to slow his breathing down.

He can't just _leave_ , can he? He can't. 

"Little brother."

Tim starts violently and scrambles to his feet with absolutely none of the grace of a seasoned vigilante. His heart rate is through the roof and it only slows marginally when he sees Cass perched in his window. 

"Cass," he pants, swallowing past the remainders of panic in his throat. "What's going on?"

She steps down from the window and closes it behind her before reaching up to pull off her cowl. Her face is creased with worry and she twists the cowl in her hands for a minute before dropping it on Tim's bed. 

"Worried," she says, stepping towards him. "Hug."

It doesn't sound like she's asking, but Tim knows her well enough now to know that she is. He nods and she comes forward to wrap her arms around him. Her grip is strong and gentle and warm and Tim just wants to cry again. But he can't. Something is happening and he has to take care of it.

"About what?" he asks, leaning into the embrace and savoring it because he knows it'll be a long time until he gets another one. 

Cass leans back just enough to plant her pointer finger in his chest. 

"Me?" Tim raises an eyebrow. "Why are you worried about me?"

Cass takes her hand away and wraps him up again. 

"You are... sad. Tired. Gone," she tells him, rocking the two of them gently. 

"I've been busy-" he tries to say, but she cuts him off.

"No," she says sharply. "Not busy. Truth, please."

It's suddenly too much and he pulls back before his skin can start crawling. Cass lets him go instantly and steps out of his bubble to give him space to speak. 

At first, he doesn't. But he does start pacing. His hands are running through his hair and a steady hum emanates from deep in his chest until he finds the right words to say. And Cass doesn't push. This is why Tim loves her the most. She doesn't push. She waits for him to be ready and she's there once he is.

"I don't want to be Red Robin anymore," is what comes out of his mouth when he finally speaks. He stops pacing and stands there for a minute. That's not what he meant to say. 

Cass nods slowly. She takes a seat on the edge of his bed and runs her fingers over the softness of his weighted blanket. 

"What... do you want?" she asks.

What does he want. What does Tim want. Does not compute.

"I don't know," he says automatically because he doesn't have a real answer. 

Cass shakes her head. "No. What. Do. You. _Want_."

Tim sits heavily beside her and stares down at his fingers where they tap on his thighs. If he could have anything, what would he want? 

"I want to go to MIT," he says, and wow, that's a shock. He has no idea where that came from. But now that he's said it, he wants it with a vengeance. “Computer science.”

Cass nods, a small smile crinkling her eyes. “Good. More.”

More? What else could he want? 

“I want a dog,” he says, because doesn’t he? He’s always wanted one. He asked Bruce for one, once, and he said they didn’t have time for one. Tim remembers those words when he sees Titus ambling around the manor. 

“What else.”

“I want to get my nose pierced. Septum,” he continues, on a roll. He'd always thought they looked cool, but Bruce had always vetoed any body modification because they are identifying features.

(Tim always thought that was stupid. How are their scars not identifying features but a tattoo or piercing is?)

“More?”

Tim’s so excited his hands are flapping as he says, “I want to never wear a suit again in my _life_.”

“Yes!” Cass crows, matching his excited bouncing. She bounces to her feet to stand in front of him. “Do it. Need to.”

Tim’s excitement fizzles out instantly. He looks away. 

“I can’t.”

The poke she lands on his forehead is startling enough to make him look at her again.

“Can,” she stresses. “Should. Trust me. You deserve it.”

Tim shakes his head again, adamant. Cass sighs softly and reaches forward to take his head between her hands. She pulls him forward gently and presses a kiss to his forehead, then lets him go.

“Think about it. Please,” she tells him. She pulls her cowl back on and opens the window. She holds up her right hand, three fingers spread. _Love you_. 

Tim’s head bobs mindlessly, but he still says, “love you, too.”

And then she’s gone.

-

Two months after his late-night conversation with Cass, Tim shows up at the Manor intent on clearing away the belongings he has left there. He doesn’t know if Bruce is home, or if Damian is home, or if anyone else is home, but it doesn’t matter.

They couldn’t change his mind anyway. He’s not sure they’d try. 

He doesn’t run into anybody on his way to his old bedroom and he’s happy about that, but once he gets to his room, he feels a rush of nostalgia that squeezes his chest. 

Images of his time as Robin, of his time as Bruce’s son, of his time with a family, tumble through his brain and he can hardly push through before he chokes up. 

He places the case on his bed and gets to work. 

Tim leaves most things behind. He didn’t have much personal stuff left in here anyway, most of the important things are at his apartment.

(Or, rather, in the boxes in the rented U-Haul currently parked in front of Wayne Manor.)

Once he’s done, all he has is a backpack full of things. He grabs the stuffed pit bull on his desk that Dick got him for his fourteenth birthday and closes the door behind him. 

His footsteps are quiet as he makes his way down the hall, but he has one more thing to take care of before he can leave.

“Master Tim,” Alfred says from behind him. Tim spins around and can’t help the smile that overtakes his face. 

“Hi, Alfie,” he says, grinning at his grandpa. “I was looking for you.”

“Is that so,” Alfred says, his mouth twitching with amusement. He glances at the backpack and raises an eyebrow. “Going somewhere, are we?”

Tim’s smile falters and he rocks on the balls of his feet. 

“I’m… leaving,” he says stiffly. “I’m moving to Boston.”

If Alfred is surprised, he doesn’t show it. Tim should’ve expected that. 

“Boston?” he repeats.

And then suddenly Tim can’t stop talking.

“I applied to MIT and I didn’t think I’d get in but I did so I’m moving to Boston and I’m done being Red Robin, I don’t wanna do it anymore, I left my suit upstairs, I’m sorry-” he rushes out all at once until Alfred cuts him off.

“Timothy, my dear boy, please,” he says gently, resting a hand on Tim’s upper arm. “Nothing would bring me greater joy than for all of my charges to hang up those dreaded capes. You do not have to apologize to me. I am glad you are doing what makes you happy.”

Tim blinks through the tears that have gathered. 

“Oh,” he says. His brain comes back online and he takes a shuddering breath. “Okay. That’s good. I’ll call you all the time, Alfie, I promise.”

“See to it that you do, Timothy,” Alfred replies, before drawing him into a hug. 

Tim closes his eyes and rests his head against the old butler’s shoulder.

“I’m gonna miss you, Alfie,” he whispers, squeezing his eyes shut tighter when a single tear escapes.

“And I, you,” Alfred replies, giving one final squeeze before letting Tim go. 

“I should go,” Tim says, rubbing his eyes with his sleeve and grabbing the stuffed animal he’d dropped on the kitchen counter. 

“I will see you out, then,” Alfred hums, before herding Tim toward the door. 

When Tim gets there, he’s emotionally rung out, and he’s not expecting anything else, but then Cass appears at the bottom of the stairs with a backpack, a rolling suitcase, and a pillow. She stomps her way toward him and comes to a stop beside him, pushing the handle of the suitcase down and letting it stand. 

“Come with,” she says, leaning forward to hug Alfred, whose only sign of surprise is the twitch of his facial expression before it smooths out again. 

“What?” Tim says, his heart skipping. “What do you mean?”

“With you. To Boston,” she tells him, patting her suitcase to prove her point.

“Why?” he asks, staring at her incredulously. 

“Like you. Want to be… more than…” she says, before punching the palm of her hand. “More than a weapon.”

Tim can’t. Tim.exe has crashed. 

“What?” he repeats. 

“Come with,” she repeats firmly. “Can’t stop me.”

Tim shakes his head and clears his throat.

“Okay. You’re coming with me. That’s cool,” he babbles. “Did you tell Bruce?”

Cass shrugs. “No.”

“Shouldn’t you?”

“Did you?”

Silence. 

“Okay,” Tim relents. He turns to Alfred and gives him one last hug. “I’ll call you once we get to Boston.”

“I will await your call,” Alfred replies, hugging the two of them in turn, before stepping back. “Should I inform Master Bruce of your departure?”

Tim twists his fingers and after a moment, shakes his head.

“Can you tell him once we get to Boston?” he asks. “I don’t want him to try to stop us.”

“Fair enough,” Alfred concedes. 

And then, together, Tim and Cass are gone. 

**Author's Note:**

> hey i love cass could you tell have a nice day/night/it's 5am pls save me


End file.
